Under a sunny Estrogen County sky, a collection of people stood in the HSU faculty carpark.

"It's green."

The General sighed and put his arm around Darry's shoulders.

"It's cool," Cal said. He looked over at the General with awe-filled eyes, waiting to see how the president would effortlessly subdue any feelings of unrest among his flock.

"It's green."

"I think it looks ok," Diebin offered.

"It's green."

"I like green." Emmy made a show of smoothing the wrinkles out of her velvet skirt.

"It's green."

"My one and only love was fond of green," Dande swooned against Emmy, lost in the moment. Emmy shoved the Wench none-too-gently back into the near-upright stance she normally posed in.

"It's green."

The General leaned down and whispered something into Darry's ear which, under normal conditions, might have had a less volatile grrl falling to his feet in a heap of hormones.

"It's gr- green," Darry forced out through her teeth, determined not to spoil an opportunity to feel angry.

"Wait a minute," Cal said. "Isn't THAT your car?"

True enough, an identical BMW (apart from being midnight blue) was pulling into the lot. Diebin leapt into action as fast as the leather catsuit would allow. She pulled the General's arm off Darry and yanked him back toward the administration building.

"Oh my god," she exclaimed. "Those acceptance letters have to be signed in the next 10 minutes, or the world as we know it will come to an end!"

"What are you talking about?" The General asked. However, he obviously wasn't having the same effect on Darry's mood, so he obligingly allowed his secretary to lead him away.

On the way, Diebin and her boss passed the groundskeeper walking out to join the group. At the same time, a dapper-looking man was getting out of the blue car.

"Hey," Cal observed. "It's that pharmaceutical rep who borrowed your car in the first place."

Darry turned very slowly toward Cal. "You told him which car was mine?"

"Uh..." he backed away slightly, reaching for his braid before the Nurse could.

"Do I know you?" Dande was asking Mr. Vocab. "You seem so familiar."

The Diva realized that the situation around her was getting precarious. She was going to have to take charge.

"Cal!" she yelled, momentarily distracting Darry. "Take Miss Dande back to her room. She looks pale."

Dande had tilted her head to one side while looking at Mr. Vocab, as if shifting the position of her brain in order to better remember how she should know this...fellow. One arm was wrapped protectively around her flat belly.

Cal did as he was ordered, realizing that he was stuck between the two most temperamental staff members at HSU. He dodged past Darry's grasp and offered his arm to Dande who continued to look at Mr. Vocab over her shoulder while allowing herself to be led away.

By this time, Darry's ire had a new target. She folded her arms across her chest as the university's benefactor strode toward her with a nonplussed look. Mr. Vocab began walking toward him. Darry grabbed the groundskeeper by his orange frilly frock and growled "He's mine."

"Grrr."

Emmy attempted to extricate Mr. Vocab from the deathgrip with which Darry held him and said sternly. "I need some help moving furniture in my new office. Now."

Torn between obeying two masters, Mr. Vocab heeded the call from the one he knew would give him the most grief should he disobey. He turned and followed the Diva back toward the building.

"Ahh...and how are you, my good Nurse?" Palpatine said mellifluously as he reached Darry, now standing alone, visibly steaming. He held out the keys.

*~*~*~*~

"All right, Diebin," the General sighed. "Which one of these stacks are the acceptance letters?"

The secretary made a sweeping gesture with her arm, dramatically shoving all of the papers from the General's desk. "Those!"

"Riiiggghhht," It was mostly a growl. He reached for her.

"Eeep." The door slammed shut.

~*~*~*~

"I'm sure I know that man," Dande said almost to herself. Cal tried to steer her toward the stairs.

"Maybe you met at the stables," Cal suggested. He didn't understand WHY it wasn't a particularly good idea for Dande to pursue this line of thinking, but he somehow just sensed it would upset her delicate disposition even more.

"Ah, he must be the harse-man. That must be it. Ahhh..." Dande ran her manicured fingers through her flowing hair and then turned to stare vapidly at Cal. "Do you know my Master? He is the most wonderful man in the world. And he loves me. He'll be coming to see me when my time is near."

"I'm sure," Cal said, urging Dande toward her room. "Why don't you rest. It'll...it'll be good for the baby. "

"Yes, my beautiful baby. The Master would want me to stay healthy for our baby..."

*Insert any Lifetime Channel made-for-TV-movie-starring-Jane-Seymore music here.*

*~*~*~*~

Darry grabbed the keys without saying a word and stalked over to the cars. The benefactor followed.

"Which one is mine?" Darry growled.

"Technically, they're both yours. I just thought I would pick this one up for you on the off-chance that the garage's paint job did not live up to your...standards."

Darry turned and offered him her best sarcastic smile. He smiled back.

"So, this green P.O.S. was my car, and this blue jobbie is my new car?"

"Quite right."

Darry opened the door of the green BMW and retrieved her Velvet Goldmine CD from the dash. Then she slammed the door disdainfully.

"I also took the liberty of stopping by Marshall Fields and picking up a few things for you."

Palpatine rightly guessed that the university could do without its new fountain, if only to keep its medical staff well tailored and off a homicidal track for another month.

"Really?" Darry opened one of the rear doors of the Beamer and sat down amongst the shopping bags.

"I hope they meet with your approval." He leaned down to look in at the smiling Nurse.

Cal, returning to his dorm after dropping off the Wench, glanced over at the carpark just in time to see the pharmaceutical rep get yanked into the back of the blue BMW.

*~*~*~*~

"Looks like Darry has herself a new car and all's well that ends well," Shana said as she looked out the window, watching the blue Beamer's windows begin to fog.

"I guess we should do something with the other one, then," the Dean said, inspecting the odd planter sitting on Shana's desk.

"I'm sure between the two of us, we can come up with something."

"Shana, what the hell is this?"

*~*~*~*~

The General knocked on Emmy's new office door and entered without waiting for an answer. Emmy was sitting ramrod straight at her desk with a very artificial smile plastered across her face.

To her right, Mr. Vocab was hanging a picture. The General sauntered into the office.

Seating himself at a rakish angle on the desk , black leather trousers making a swoon-inducing sound, the General turned and motioned to the door. Shyly, Brenda entered.

The smile remained glued on Emmy's face, but her eyes narrowed, wondering what was going on.

"First of all, allow me to express my best wishes to you in your new career as HSU's Public Relations officer." Privately, he questioned the value of having the university's most flighty personality-after the Wench, of course- be in charge of drumming up business. (Nonetheless, the picture accompanying the "Message from the President" in the prospectus was probably still the biggest attractor of new students.)

"Secondly," he dropped something on the desk in front of Emmy. It landed with a clang. George, thinking the General wanted to play a game, rapped loudly on the underside of the desk in response. Emmy kicked and pretended to be slamming the desk drawer.

Then she glanced down at the object on her desk. It was a key ring upon which were a set of keys.

"I've met privately with both the Dean and the Office of Student Affairs, and we've concluded that you will need a mode of transportation if you are to garner new students for our fair institution."

These were the keys to Darry's formerly blue, then tan, and now green BMW.

The General fixed Emmy with The Look. "Nngghhh," she said.

"Nnnngghhh," came the muffled reply from under the desk. Emmy glanced sternly at Mr. Vocab, hoping to mislead the General into thinking he had spoken anything else other than his hallmark phrase.

"Grrr?"

Ignoring the exchange, the General motioned to Brenda. "In addition, I would like you to take Brenda here as your...mascot... I would like you to help mold her into the Ho I know she can become. I want her to be sort of a pet project of yours." Brenda nearly swooned. Obviously, she still needed some training.

Emmy's mouth was becoming sore from the insipid smile she tried to retain while balling her hands into fists in her lap.

This was still because of George, Emmy thought to herself. The General is jealous, but rather than releasing his feelings in a more...passionate fashion, as Emmy had hoped, he was making her life miserable.

As if reading Emmy's thoughts, the General stood and smiled. "Oh yes, Brenda also shares the car with you." He blew her a kiss and left the room.

*~*~*~*~

"Damn Darry and her damned cars anyway, " the Diva said blackly to Diebin as they sat at Wangers.

"Why Emmy upset?" George asked around his mai tai.

"'Emmy upset' because Darry had a perfectly good spare car she could have given Emmy. But did she? NO! She was too busy testing out the shocks of the new one with that...that..."

"Grrr."

"Shut up." Emmy glared at Mr. Vocab, who had only been invited along because it was 'Men's Night' at Wangers and if the grrls wanted free drinks, it was either him or the Padawannabe as the second guy.

"Come, on, have another margarita and forget about it." Die grabbed at a passing waiter.

"Hey, watch those hands, lady."

"Another round, my good man."

"It's just not fair. Darry boffs this guy every chance she gets and the General never gets angry at her...unless she makes him mad on purpose," Emmy groused. She had sulking down to an art form.

"That's because he doesn't KNOW about it. You practically wave George in his face every chance you get," Diebin tried to explain.

"Well, I'm gonna tell." Emmy reached for her cell phone.

Diebin lurched at her, almost unsettling the Diva's tiara. "Are you nuts? You do and we'll never get any more money for the university!"

"So?"

"So, then no more students, no more office," Diebin searched for something that would bring home the argument. "No more Nutella."

"Oh," said Emmy, sobering to the idea. "That would be bad."

"Be bad," George agreed.

"Shut up, " Diebin snapped.

"Grrl," affirmed the linguist of the group.

"Well, I can still make her life miserable," Emmy said maliciously dialing. She didn't spend an entire drunken night embarrassing herself at Wanker College for nothing. "Yeah, you got an obnoxious kid there, 'bout nine, good with mechanical stuff?" The Diva waited while Die poured more drinks, glancing sidelong at Emmy.

"George like Emmy," George said to no one in particular.

"Grrr," (translated to "Maul likes Tasha, Why isn't Tasha here?")

"Hey, kid?" Pause. "Yeah, whatever--ya know that 'angel' you met a few weeks ago?" Pause. "She just told me she thinks you're really cute and she'd like to be your girlfriend."

Diebin grabbed at the phone. 'Em! That's horrible!"

"Yeah, well, I've had a horrible day."

"George sorry."

"Grrr."

"The General doesn't trust me as far as he can throw me, I'm attached at the hip to a jungle man- albeit a rather handsome jungle man-" Emmy batted her eyelashes at George. "I have half a car, and now I have to babysit --"

"Hi!" said Brenda cheerfully, walking up to their table, Cal in tow.